


Heat Rash Makes Irkens Do Silly Things

by Invader_Sam



Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Gen, Summer, ZADF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-17
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-30 11:54:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17828072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Invader_Sam/pseuds/Invader_Sam
Summary: A quiet moment on a hill with a boy, an alien and the cicadas.





	Heat Rash Makes Irkens Do Silly Things

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little one-shot that's been sitting unfinished on my computer for a few years. I dusted it off and wrapped it up because I haven't been able to stop thinking about it lately.

“Does that star have any planets?”

Zim opened his eyes. Now that the miserable sun had finally set and the park was deserted, he’d removed his wig and contacts and had been relishing not having the itchy things in place anymore. “What star?”

Lying in the grass to his left, Dib raised an arm to point at the night sky. “That one.”

The alien rolled his eyes. As if pointing made it more clear. Stupid child. “Oh yeah, three,” he lied.

“Do they have life on them?” Dib asked.

“One does.” Zim waved a hand in the air vaguely. “Dog-people. Furry faces, tails, fleas. Disgusting creatures.”

“Really?” Dib said, and the alien felt the human’s eyes on him. He tried to keep a straight face, but the corner of his mouth twitched without permission. “Hey...” Dib frowned. “Are you messing with me?”

“What?? _Noooooo_ ,” Zim said. When the boy raised a fist to strike him, he held up a hand and said, “Can you blame me? Please, you can’t just point at the infinite sky and think I’ll know which star you mean. I mean, I’m am _AZ_ ing but even _I_ have limits.”

Dib lowered his fist and settled back down on the grass. “Yeah, I guess. If I had a star map could you tell me?”

“If the star was registered with the Galactic Database, yes,” Zim answered. He folded his ungloved hands over his stomach. Being so under-dressed, in cotton t-shirt and shorts, was still unnerving. With the temperatures climbing into the nineties, however, it was necessary. His uniform didn’t breathe at all, and after a few days he’d started to develop a rash under his arms and on his lower back. It had been a humiliating discovery, and had spurred him to seek out these sparse, but comfortable garments. He’d even abandoned his boots in favor of simple leather sandals, which at the moment sat discarded a few feet away.

The grass beneath him was soft and the ground was beginning to cool. He wracked his brain, trying to remember if he’d ever experienced a sensation quite like it. A quick scan of his memory databank said he hadn’t. A weak breeze blew over them and he raised his antennae to catch it. A shiver ran from the tips down to his toes and he almost smiled, but caught himself. He was vulnerable in this moment, much too much so. What would the Tallest say if they could see him like this?

He let out a sniff. As if they would care. They thought him a fool, thought he couldn’t read the derision in their voices when they spoke to him. Well, then why should he care what they–

“How do you do that?” Dib’s voice pulled him out of his thoughts.

“Do what?”

“It just sounded like you snorted – like, breathed through your nose. But you don’t have one.”

“Just because it doesn’t protude obtusely from my face doesn’t mean I don’t have one,” Zim said. He turned his head towards the child and flared his nostrils exaggeratedly.

“Oh! Oh wow, so it’s like a snake or a lizard,” Dib said, smiling as he absorbed the new information.

“Lizard, yes. You’ve compared me to those creatures before.” The Irken nodded, turning back to face the sky.

“Well, you call me a monkey all the time.”

“I didn’t say I found the comparison insulting,” Zim said. “From what I gather, your lizards were once fearsome giant beasts. I recall someone on TV saying they ‘ruled the Earth’ – so I consider myself in good company.”

Dib laughed quietly.

“I fail to see the humor,” Zim muttered.

The human adjusted his glasses with one hand. “Oh, it wasn’t really funny, I guess. I was just thinking, ‘Man, this guy can put a good spin on anything.’ Do they teach that back home, or is that just a _you_ thing?”

Zim shrugged. “We’re a proud people.”

“Arrogant you mean.”

The alien smirked. “Wasn’t ‘egotistical’ the word you were bandying about earlier today?”

“Do you deny it?”

“I didn’t say I did. Though I don’t know if it’s bred or taught,” Zim said. “But you’ve met a handful of other Irkens. Humility like Skooge’s is rare, trust me.”

Dib chuckled. “And even _he_ isn’t exactly humble. He brags about Blorch anytime he gets. Where is he, anyway?”

“Exploring the planet,” Zim answered. “He says he’s gathering data, but who knows. All I know is he took GIR with him, and the base has never been more peaceful.”

“You mean boring,” Dib said, and the alien could feel human eyes on him again. “Admit it, that’s why you called this truce for the break. Otherwise you’d be stuck talking to your computer all summer.”

Zim kept silent. That might’ve been part of it, though it was the unbearable heat that had driven him to make the offer. Around the same time he was discovering that embarrassing heat rash, his base had reported dangerously low levels of coolant and had to be partially shut down to conserve energy and prevent a meltdown. Without his equipment fully operational, it would have been impossible to launch any sort of grand takeover plan. So until the weather cooled, he had to live with the ceasefire.

It wasn’t as horrible as he’d imagined it would be. True, the big-headed boy still grated on his nerves, but he provided minimal amusement. And an air-conditioned home. With the base disabled and GIR and Skoodge off sight-seeing, Zim found himself spending most nights on the floor of the boy’s bedroom. With no ready source of power to plug into, he’d even begun entering sleep-mode to recharge. It wasn’t ideal, but he enjoyed the conversations over coffee with Proffessor Membrane in the mornings. The fact that it annoyed the hell out of Dib was a nice bonus.

A lightning bug flashed directly above his face and he blinked, bringing himself back to the present moment. The sounds of the city were muffled, though the park was flagged by highways on two sides, and he could hear a strange buzzy-whirring sound all around them. It rose and fell in volume like a tide of noise. “What _**is**_ that?” he asked, pointing his antenae this way and that, trying to make out a point of origin.

“Cicadas,” Dib said. “Insects. It’s how they communicate. Every seven years or so a generation of them hatch, crawl out of the ground and into the trees, make that sound until they find a mate, lay their eggs and then die. All before the end of the summer.”

Zim frowned. “What a miserable existence. I suppose the miserable racket is appropriate.”

Dib was quiet for a moment. “I guess...” he said at last, “...that if you don’t know any better, you just accept that the life you have is the best there is, and you just kinda go with it.”

Subtlety was not something the child had mastered. Zim’s brow furrowed. An unexpected consequence of this ceasefire was that Dib had begun a campaign of a different sort, trying to convince him to give up his goal of planetary conquest. It was always done indirectly like this, though how he managed to work it into nearly all of their conversations, Zim had to admit, was impressive. Generally he ignored it, but after nearly a month, it was wearing on him. “Yes, Dib. Yes you do.”

The boy was silent, but Zim could feel eyes on him again and he worked to set his face in a neutral mask. The symphony of the cicadas swelled and quieted, and the breeze washed over him again. For a backwater ball of dirt, it had it's moments.

“You know you could always–”

The Irken sat up, reaching for his sandals. “I require sustenance. Do you think the clerk at the mini-mart has consumed enough canibus that I can leave my contacts out?”

Dib pushed himself up as well, checking his smart watch. “Uh, probably, yeah.”

“Good.” Zim stood, brushed bits of grass from the back of his shorts. He took a few steps down the hill before turning back. “Are you coming or what?”

“Y-yeah. Yeah, I'm coming.” Dib scrambled to slip his sneakers back on. “Hang on a sec.”

Zim slipped his hands into his pockets, feeling slightly less naked and a little more like himself. “Well, hurry up then. And you'd better have monies with you.” He turned and continued on down the hill.

“Why am I buying??” Dib asked as he hurried to catch up.

“Section 7, Subsection B. 'The party known as 'The Dib' shall forthwith provide all required sustenances in exchange for the party known as 'The Almighty Zim' not constantly pointing how much his head resembles a Thanksfeasting's Day parade balloon.”

“But you made fun of my head three times today!”

“But not in those words.”

“I think you're ignoring the spirit of the agreement.”

“And I think _you're_ just mad you're a bad treatise negotiator.”

“I'm twelve!”

“That's no excuse.”

Their bickering continued as they descended the hill, their voices fading and blending with the chorus of the cicadas rising up over the trees.


End file.
